An Artificial Intelligence (AI)-assisted tool can crack over 50% of the most commonly used passwords in less than a minute, a new study published on Sunday said.
The study done by Melbourne-based Home Security Heroes, a group of online security experts, employed an AI password cracking tool called PassGAN (password generative adversarial network) to analyse a list of over 15 million passwords and also found that PassGAN can generate “multiple password properties and improve the quality of predicted passwords, making it easier for cybercriminals to crack your passwords and gain access to your personal data”, the company said in the report.
According to the study, 51% of common passwords can be cracked in under a minute, 65% in under an hour, 71% in under a day, and 81% in under a month. The research further showed that the majority of six-character passwords (or lesser) were cracked almost instantly. The study suggests that passwords with at least 18 characters are considered safe against tools like PassGAN, with a minimum of ten months required to crack an 18-character password containing only numbers.
Another recent report by cyber security firm Hive published…
